Free Tom Clancy's Act of Valor by Dick Couch, George Galdorisi Page A

main road; a cluster of huts; and a central building that was a cantina, a general store, and a Pemex station. There were two armed forces in the area: the Costa Rican national army and the local drug cartel. The cartel considered the village and this isolated compound a part of its turf and under its protection. These two forces seldom confronted each other. This was not because of the normal practice of bribing officials, at least not out here at the foot-soldier level. Theirs was a practical accommodation. Both were well armed, and neither the cartel security men nor the
federales
wanted to end up facedown in the mud and the mangrove. So they gave each other a wide berth.
    Inside the compound’s largest building, a long, low structure, Lisa Morales hung from a rafter in a 20x20 foot end room—the tips of her bare toes just able to gain a purchase on the plank flooring. Old Spanish newspapers and mildew covered the room’s peeling clapboard walls, and a single yellow bulb dangled overhead. It was just enough light to cast her slim shadow on the wall and floor. The door pushed open from the exterior and filtered daylight spilled into the ro Cd icast her som, illuminating Morales’s bloody face and filthy clothes. Tommy filled the door for a moment, then walked up to the battered physician. She raised her head and peered at him through slitted, swollen eyes.
    “I am a doctor, and my organization will pay a generous reward.”
    Tommy stood a foot from Morales and smiled. He was a brutish figure with a pocked face, narrow eyes, and a thatch of unruly, unkempt hair. He wore a rumpled polo shirt and pleated slacks—both with streaks of blood on them. Just under six feet, he weighed close to 250 and was running to fat. Yet he exuded a raw animal power that was both compelling and cruel. He held a cell phone on speakerphone in front of her swollen and bruised lips.
    “I am a doctor, and my organization will pay you a reward,” Morales said again, her voice pleading and weary.
    Half a world way, sitting in a Lincoln Town Car on a deserted street in Brovary, Ukraine, Christo sifted through a collection of photos of Morales and Ross. They showed the two of them in her apartment window, sitting at a café, and walking through the streets of Barranca. Christo himself was dressed in a hand-tailored Bond Street suit, with a crisp white shirt and floral tie. He frowned, shifted in the soft leather seats, and gave his attention to the image of Morales on his iPhone.
    “Tell me, what is it about you Americans that makes you feel entitled to interfere in my affairs—affairs which are of no concern to you whatsoever.” He was smiling, but there was a hard edge to his voice.
    “What . . . what are you talking about? My name is Lisa Morales. I am a physician, nothing more.” She struggled to continue as Tommy held the phone closer in his enormous hands, but she could only squint at the cell-phone screen through blood-laced eyes.
    “I know who you are, Miss Morales, and I know who you work for. I know who Mr. Ross works for, or worked for. What I don’t know is how much you know. So why don’t you make this easy on both of us and tell me just exactly what you think you know.”
    “I’m a doctor. I try to prevent mothers from dying at childbirth,” she replied, rallying somewhat. “I treat children with malnutrition who are half starved because of you and your dirty business. I work with—” but her sentence ended when Tommy slammed his open palm into the side of her head.
    “How did that feel, Miss Morales? Not good, I think. So I want you to think about what I have just said,” Christo replied with the same forced smile, “and what I want from you. Now, you have a nice day at the spa.” Then to Tommy, “Take me off speakerphone.”
    Tommy disengaged the speakerphone, put the cell phone up to his ear, and stepped away from her.
    “Keep her alive, and don’t call me back until she talks.” Then, thinking of Tommy